Platform Roundup

Latest Reviews

Nintendo 3DS -
100%

Nintendo 3DS -
80%

You would be very, very hard pressed to argue that SMTIV:A isn't the best gameplay the franchise has ever seen. The press-turn system by itself is widely considered to be among the best battle systems in JRPGs, and for good reason, as it provides very powerful rewards for players with correct team composition and specific enemy knowledge, yet can severely punish players without those qualities, resulting in a challenging and dynamic system that demands players use every facet of the other game play elements, from fusion to negotiation, in order to successfully beat the game. Nocturne, the inventor of the system, remains an amazing game to this day because of the press-turn mechanic (along with its various other qualities); however, Nocturne has some very PS2 JRPG jank in it, as well as some bizarre mechanical decisions, that make a few portions of it frustrating and clunky for the uninitiated to play (though the excellent Hardtype mod fixes some of these issues). SMT IV erased some of that jank with more streamlined mechanics, such as being able to choose which skills demons get on fusions, as well as upping the stakes of the press-turn system with the Smirk mechanic, but ended up mostly advantaging player to the point of being a non-challenge outside a few of the early areas of the game.

SMTIV:A improves on the streamlines of SMTIV even further through the addition and changes of many mechanics. The first is the skill affinity system; save a few demon-exclusive skills, all skills are pretty much transferable between all demons, but to combat every demon from becoming the same, the game introduces skill-affinities, which means that certain demons will be better at using certain skills and the inverse. For example, while you could put a ice-spell on a fire-based demon, the skill affinity system prevents the fire-based demon from using the ice-spell to the same effective as other non-fire demons could. The system opens up the deep customization offered in SMTIV by incentivizing playing to a demon's strength yet still offering players the option to flex in certain spells if needed, rather than simply restricting them as SMTIV had done. The smirk mechanic has also been altered, receiving both buffs and nerfs; buffed in regards to magic attacks having a 100% crit rate, guaranteeing press turns, and being able to hold on to smirk, guaranteeing the defensive buffs for the incoming enemy turn, as well as nerfed by giving out spells and items which can dispel Smirk on both allies and enemies. These changes to the smirk mechanic mean that rather being a simple stakes-increase for the press-turn system, Smirking actually becomes another system for both the player and the enemy to exploit to their advantage, resulting in almost arms-race situation to maintain smirk and negate your opponents, in addition to regular arms-race of the press-turn system. Also Hama and Mudo based spells now do damage, making demons who specialize in these skills on equal footing with their elemental siblings, while also making demons weak to them more exploitable in actual combat. There's also some little changes to fusion lines, stats, skill effects, partner AI, boss scripts, buffing/debuffing, etc. that make SMTIV:A a far more cohesive, robust combat system than of the previous press-turn games in the series.

What's the catch? Well, the rest of the game. I won't get into the details of the story or thematic, as this post (https://medium.com/@wondermagenta/what-makes-smt-iv-apocalypse-so-disappointing-2a9b6ffb2b8b) does a pretty good job of outlining the issues, but it is far, far below the usual story quality of mainline SMT games. Even the non-combat gameplay is only OK at best; dungeons are rendered in 3D but it never uses this fact to its advantage, what dialogue options there are either don't matter or are hampered by the story attached to them, questing never deviates or experiments from what's establishes in the first few hours of the game, and despite being quite a long game with varied locations world exploration remains an afterthought. I do like the majority of the design work on both the new demons and characters, and there are some good tracks in the game, but as a whole the aesthetic package is more of a minor upgrade to the shaky one we got in SMTIV. As a whole the care and thought given to the battle system seems to disappear when considering the rest of the game, which is absolutely shame given the quality of its combat.

Thankfully, these issues are somewhat minimized by the fact that the game does not force you to spend time doing non-combat activities if you wish not to. It's because of this that I can still hold that SMTIV:A is a very good game, in spite of a being a lopsided package.

6 Months Ago

Private

Nintendo 3DS -
70%

75%. Great gameplay as expected of SMT, vastly improved UI and QOL improvements from SMTIV, but it has a trash story with one-note characters and utterly ruins everything about Flynn. A strange attempt to hybridize Persona and SMT story elements that, frankly, failed.

Nintendo 3DS -
80%

Nintendo 3DS -
80%

Nintendo 3DS -
80%

Great game , it improved parts of smt4 like the parterner system and the smirking effects. i liked the characters alot and i enjoyed the plot however the lack of a real law, chaos and neutral endings feels weird. And the endings that are available are more of good guy ending and bad guy ending and i feel like the good guy ending feels more like a persona game and the game really sets it up so you will probably not do the bad guy ending .Also the last dungeon Sucks

Nintendo 3DS -
70%

If you like SMT IV, you will like this as it's pretty much the exact same gameplay. Those familiar w/ the series will not be disappointed. The end of the game gets to be a pretty heavy slog but getting to that point is a lot of fun.

Nintendo 3DS -
90%

Fans of the Shin Megami Tensei series will know what they're getting into with SMTIV: Apocalypse. SMT4A continues the series' tradition of high difficulty mixed with very mature themes concerning the concepts of morality and religion.

While SMT4A is still definitely a few steps above most JRPGs when it comes to difficulty, I found it to be one of the easier titles in the series. The game is far more forgiving than the original SMTIV, which is itself far more forgiving than SMT: Nocturne. I played on the highest difficulty setting (excluding the DLC) named "War", and I still found it to be significantly easier than Nocturne's normal mode. Regardless, SMT fans will still find a decent amount of challenge, as smart demon fusing and party composition is still vital to victory.

One complaint that many people seem to have with SMT4A is the fact that it's much more character focused than most SMT titles barring Persona. I personally found this to be a great addition, because I loved the diverse cast of likable characters. However, SMT has always had a big emphasis on independence; finding your own path in a world full of differing opinions. In Apocalypse, there's really only one "main" path and every party member more or less shares the same sentiment when it comes to the choices you make in the game, which is a stark contrast to every other main title in the series where party members generally ended up hating each other to the point of wanting to kill one another. SMT4A's cast of characters feels much more like Persona than it does SMT, and they really push the "power of friendship" trope hard in this one.

Overall, however, I have to say that I enjoyed SMT4A as much or maybe even a little more than the original SMT4. The combat is still fantastic, the music is the same trademark SMT metal people know and love, and I personally generally enjoyed the inclusion of a more diverse cast who don't really fall into the "chaos" or "order" category.